An LED lamp consists of, among other components, a heat sink to help cool the lamp by dissipating emitted heat to the surrounding air. A heat sink helps ensure that the lamp operates properly, even at high temperatures. The amount of heat that a heat sink is able to dissipate depends on the surface area of a heat sink. The larger the surface area, the more heat a heat sink is able to dissipate. Increasing surface area, however, may increase the dimensions of the heat sink which may result in a larger a larger lamp.
Increasing the size of the lamp may not be desirable, however. When designing a retrofit LED lamp to replace an incandescent lamp, for example, it is desirable that the replacement lamp approximate or closely resemble a standard form factor of the incandescent lamp being replaced. Otherwise, the replacement lamp may not properly fit the application for which it was intended. Increasing the size of the heat sink may also result in increased costs of manufacturing the lamp. Thus, it may be desirable to increase the surface area of a heat sink without increasing the size of the heat sink and without increasing the cost of manufacturing the heat sink.